City Wrong To Enforce Id Law

Nevertheless, Lake Worth is continuing to enforce its worker identification ordinance, a law strikingly similar to one that was struck down last month in

In that case, U.S. District Judge Norman Roettger found that the Town of Palm Beach`s worker identification law violated the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution.

Boca Raton also has a similar law, though the city is less aggressive in enforcing it than is Lake Worth or was Palm Beach.

In Lake Worth and Boca Raton, those who are required to submit to fingerprinting and criminal background checks and to purchase an identification card hold jobs considered blue-collar or service-related.

The same was true for Palm Beach, where the indentification law no longer can be applied.

Although Lake Worth cannot boast of the extreme accumulation of wealth that typifies both Boca Raton and Palm Beach, all three cities have made a legal distinction between those who are worthy of trust and those who are worthy of suspicion.

That distinction, not coincidentally, generally conforms to a breakdown of high-income versus low-income jobs.

The application of worker identification laws to one class of people is a repugnant reminder that some cities do not adhere to the basic idea of equal treatment under the law.

The elected officials of Lake Worth and Boca Raton should be guided by Roettger`s court ruling and should rescind their worker identification laws. But city officials should be guided by a higher principle and rescind the laws because they are discriminatory.